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CHEEKY CHEESECAKE

Yum. Yum. Yum. This cheese cake is truly delectable. It looks good right? It looks as if it was made by a gourmet chef, right? You want to it eat now! I know you do!

I actually made two of these. I had a lot of cream cheese to use up and I wanted to test out two different coulis toppings. I’m glad I did make two but I’m also sorry that I did because that means I ate them. Well… not just my me….my teenage son and my mom helped. I did manage to share some of it with my neighbours but I couldn’t leave it alone. I did achieve waiting for four hours for it to chill and set, by keeping myself really busy cleaning up and things but it was definitely better the next day so if you can wait then do so. Make it a day in advance if you want it for a function. You won’t be sorry. I love it when something is so easy to make but 100% worth it when it tastes as if you made a real effort. It is sure to be a crowd pleaser with your friends.

Author: Debbie Widdows

Prep time: 30 mins Total time: 4 hours (chilling time) 30 mins

INGREDIENTS

CRUST INGREDIENTS

200g ginger biscuits

250ml margarine

FILLING INGREDIENTS

250ml single cream

2 x 250g tubs cream cheese

1/4 cup sugar 1 teaspoon vanilla essence

TOPPING INGREDIENTS

1 cup strawberries, fresh or frozen (defrosted).

1 Tablespoon lemon juice

3 Tablespoons castor sugar

INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE CRUST

Crush ginger biscuits. The best way to do this is in the food processor.

Melt the margarine. Pour the melted margarine into the crushed biscuits and pulse to combine.

Press into a 9 x inch pie dish and place in the fridge to chill whilst you make the filling.

FOR THE FILLING

Whip cream and sugar with electric mixer until stiff peaks form.

Lightly whip cream cheese with electric mixer to soften.

Add the whipped cream to the softened cream cheese.

Add vanilla essence and mix until smooth and creamy.

Pour into the chilled pie shell. Place in the fridge for at least 4 hours until set. It is better if left until the next day.

FOR THE TOPPING

Place the strawberries in a small sauce pan with the lemon juice and castor sugar and cook over a medium heat until reduced and thick.

Mash up strawberries with the back of a fork whilst it is cooking.

Allow to cool then spread on top of cheesecake. Place back in the fridge to continue chilling.

This is an awesome side dish recipe. It is the kind of dish that keeps on giving because honestly I eat it as a whole meal any day I don’t feel like cooking as well as serve it up as a side dish . It is quite satisfying and can be varied many ways, depending on your taste.

It does go great with everything, no matter what plans you have for this meal.

This is the basic recipe, feel free to adapt it with whatever you chose. Be sure to share your ideas with me! I want to know how they turned out.

I love egg fried rice. It is a filling meal in one bowl and you can make it healthy and nutritious. This is what I like to do when I serve it up as a side dish to make sure my son gets some goodness inside him because he is of the opinion that he is just fine the way that he is and why should he eat things that don’t taste good (like any vegetable) as it doesn’t seem to make any difference in his life!

On that note, I like to make this side dish with edamame beans but I battle to find them. Edamame are full of everything good. I wish I knew where I could get them regularly here in South Africa.

I like to make my egg fried rice with brown and wild rice but you can use any long grain rice. The rices, like Arborio or sushi rice, don’t work well with this kind of recipe.

Author: Debbie Widdows

Prep time: 20 minutes

Cooking time: 40 mins

INGREDIENTS

Cooked rice of your choice. Here I used brown and wild rice. Use at least 2 cups but you can discern how much you want to use. You can also use less of the ingredients reflected below if you want to make less. I make enough so that I have left overs!

Vegetables of your choice. I used peas and corn. Use finely chopped vegetables as then they will cook evenly. The ones I used here are frozen and I cooked them directly from frozen. You can use fresh vegetables.

Green pepper.

Bacon.

2 eggs.

2 lean, boneless chicken breasts or cooked chicken.

2 small apples. I used apples as I had them but I have often used fresh pineapple chunks. If you are going to use apple then make sure that you squeeze over some lemon juice to stop them turning brown.

INSTRUCTIONS

Cook your rice.

Cook and brown your chicken breasts your favourite way. I like mine spicy so I fry them in a bit of butter with Portuguese spice.

Set aside.

Chop up your bacon and fry until crispy. Then leave to drain.

Chop (diced) up the bell pepper and fry in the same pan in the bacon fat. Turn the heat down on the stove as you are going to continue to use the same pan you started with and cook everything else in the bacon fat. You should do this on a medium-low setting on the stove such as 2.

Add in the vegetables. If they are fresh fry them until they are cooked or pre-cook them in the microwave so that they are not so ‘crunchy’. When you are doing this, you will still be using the residual heat from cooking the bacon.

Crack open your two eggs in a separate bowl.

Throw them in the pan. Agitate the vegetables and cook the eggs evenly.

Add in the bacon and mix together.

Add your rice to the pan.

Mix to combine.

Cut your cooked chicken breasts up into bite sized chunks and add this into the pan. Mix well to combine.

Chop up your apples. Squeeze over about half a lemon to stop them turning brown. Add these to the pan and mix well to combine.

My daughter arrived in Hong Kong yesterday. She immigrated from South Africa and we are all left behind. Whilst I am so happy for her to have this opportunity I feel sad too.

She asked me to make a her a cake for her going away party. A gluten-free one of course. She wanted black icing – eeek – always difficult – and a multi-coloured cake.

So here is what I produced. I did not decorate the cake. Her friends did that but I made the whole thing and the icing. Here is the recipe .

The gluten free cake was my tried and trusted recipe which I have posted on here before. I have also posted this on recipe lion. All I did when I made each cake was add a few drops of the desired colouring. For this I used liquid colouring. I baked standard sized cakes the usual way and then smaller ones to fit on top which I baked for only 25 minutes.

TO MAKE THE BUTTER ICING

500 g butter, room temperature – I used salted

1 kg icing sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

5 x 5g black powdered food colouring

INSTRUCTIONS

Soften the butter with an electric mixer. It is best to do this with a free standing mixer.

Add the icing sugar a cup at a time and keep beating. Keep tasting. I find this ratio to be the best for my taste but it is not very sweet. You can add in less or more icing sugar to your own taste.

When the icing tastes as you like it add in the powdered food colouring. I did not make it into a paste first. I merely added in the tubs one at a time. The icing will come out a dark grey. This is a messy endeavour I must admit. Just make sure you clean up straight away. You will find that when you leave the icing alone the colour starts to darken and in the end it goes black.

When I had finished colouring the icing, I put it in some disposable containers and put it in the fridge to firm up as after all that mixing it was pretty warm and soft. I took it out of the fridge for about half an hour before the cake was iced.

My followers will know that I have been doing the boot camp thing and trying to lose weight. Boot camp is hard! I have to change my eating habits as well. When I was doing just boot camp I did not lose any weight. I was going twice a week. I did not really adapt my eating though – I find that difficult .

One fine day I came across some people who were at the same place I was. I saw they had a Herbalife branded car and went to investigate. I asked them, “If I had to ask you whether or not you supplied gluten-free products what would you say?” To my surprise they said yes! and here I am on my 6th week of Herbalife free from gluten and loving it! .

Boot camp was not only difficult, it was also expensive AND I was going on the cold winter evenings – what dedication is that!! . I must admit I began to complain. The Herbalife sponsors said they do a boot camp of their own too and guess what?? It’s free AND it’s during the day at a decent hour. So I migrated and felt better about everything.

I was more energized, happier and I got loads of information about eating right from attending the boot camp sessions. It’s all about the protein! I also got to taste some of the products which I fell in love with too and am now on the whole regime of tea and aloe concentrate as well. I also belong to the WhatsApp groups which give me lots of ideas of how to make my shakes extra yummy.

After being on Herbalife for 3 weeks and doing bootcamp twice a week I lost 1.9 Kilos. Now I have been on Herbalife 6 weeks and have lost another 1kg. I don’t think that is too bad. I did nothing to change my eating habits except drink the shake for breakfast and later on for lunch too. I drink the tea twice a day and I put a little aloe concentrate in that too. I add it to my water as well.

I found that I did not want to eat anything close to what I normally did. I was contented, full and did not crave anything. I snack twice a day and I don’t really eat much for supper. I don’t find myself thinking about food, or preoccupied by it.

This is the recipe for my favourite breakfast smoothie.

INGREDIENTS

1 tablespoon dried cranberry and raisin mix

1 teaspoon pomegranate seeds

1 cup strawberries – I used frozen

1 banana – frozen

1 apple with skin on

1 teaspoon mixed seeds

Lots of ice

Herbalife shake – I make mine with 100 ml lactose free milk and 150 ml water

DIRECTIONS

All I did was whiz the whole lot up with my Herbalife free from gluten vanilla shake in the food processor.

It made a much bigger shake and I just sipped on it during the morning.

The weather has turned and winter has come. When the weather starts getting really cold I make my stone soup. This is certainly a budget friendly soup as well!

This soup does take a few days to make and is always left on to cook. That is why I call it stone soup.

There is the legend of the clever traveller who got people to give him the ingredients for his soup when he had none. He walked into a new town and knew no-one. He was also hungry. He unpacked his pot, made a fire, filled it with water and brought it to the boil with nothing but a stone in it. Soon people stopped next to the pot and asked the traveller, “what is in your pot?” The traveller replied, “I am making soup but don’t have any carrots. If you bring me some carrots I will put them into the soup and then you can share it with me.” The villager went and got the traveller some carrots and so the story goes on. Eventually the traveller had a hearty, delicious soup and had made many friends who came by to share in the soup which he had promised.

In my house we believe in sharing, especially good food. We named my mom’s soup (which was passed down to me), stone soup, as she used to start her soup at the beginning of winter too. She worked from home and had a number of staff (manual, unskilled labourers) working for her. Of course they all started off their day with a cup of that soup! There was always so much to go round because she just kept adding to it. Whatever was appropriate went into the soup, leftovers, cut offs from chunks of meat or the ends of vegetables like carrot tops. My brother and I used to have it for lunch when we came home as well. There was always bits of vegetables in it and bits of meat. It is filling, satisfying and warming.

Yes, you can make this soup in a slow cooker. I have made another, different kind of soup in the slow cooker which I have also posted after this one so if you want your soup soon, then make that one but there is something about the way this soup is made which makes it taste better.

INGREDIENTS

Celery stalks

Whole small turnip

Whole leek

Whole Carrots

Beef/chicken stock cube

A chunk of your choice of meat. OR leftover roast bone with some meat on it.

A packet of soup mix, flavour of your choice.

INSTRUCTIONS

You start the soup off with a base. You can buy pre-packed soup base mixes in any supermarket or make your own. This one here is one I bought but always start off with some of the basics for flavour, like carrots, celery, onion/leek, turnip and a piece of meat. The meat is the secret to this soup recipe. Even if you don’t want a meaty soup you must throw in some sort of meat or bone from a left over roast. It adds to the flavour and you can discard it at the end if you don’t want to eat the meat. I usually use the left over from a roast, like lamb or gammon. If you don’t have that then any old piece of meat will do. A chop maybe. This time round I used a piece of pork fillet I had. I only cut off half as I used the other half. You don’t need much. If the meat is cooked that is fine. You may have leftovers from a braai or something, use it! I have never used boerewors though but there is a first time for everything.

Place all of this in a large pot of cold water along with some spices. I don’t need to tell you how much water. Use a big pot and cover the vegetables. I like the BBQ and Aromat spice combination but use which spices you like. There is a lot of water so it’s not going to taste very salty but you do need some sort of saltiness otherwise it will be tasteless. I also add in a beef/chicken stock cube.

Before you start, make sure you are going to be around the house for a couple of days as you can’t leave the soup cooking while you are not home.

Bring this slowly to the boil on a low heat. Stir it once or twice during the day. Let it simmer for most of the day. Cover it with a lid so as not to lose moisture. You do not want the water to boil away. I turn the stove down to 1 when I do this.

The soup will look like this picture at the end of day 1. Put it in the fridge overnight.

DAY TWO

Take out the soup and bring it slowly to the boil again. Give it a stir. When it has started to simmer, take out the large chunky vegetables. What I do now is add those vegetables into the food processor and pureé them. It adds the goodness back in and fools your teenagers into eating vegetables! Add this back into the soup.

Add in your choice of vegetables that you are going to eat with the soup. (or none as the puree has been added).

Now I add in a packet of soup mix. I take the packet of soup (any flavour which you like) and mix it with about 850 ml of cold water. I just throw this into the pot. Stir it and now leave it to cook for the rest of day. Taste after a while and see if you want to add anything, like salt or other spices. Sometimes I have added in a tin of tomatoes because I have felt that it needed a tomato flavouring, or Worcestershire sauce for more saltiness or another beef cube for meatiness. It is up to you and what kind of flavours you like.

At the end of day two when you are ready to eat it, it should look like the picture in the bowl. I served this soup with buttermilk rolls which I made myself too and go down very well with kids! (Recipe to be posted soon).

Every lunch time when my son comes home he has one or two cups of soup with some buttermilk rolls and that does him until supper time! I eat a cup of soup for lunch, making sure I scoop up the vegetables and meat as well. It is a complete meal and that does me until supper time!

Keep putting the soup in the fridge at night and the next day you can just add in whatever you have in your fridge you don’t want to waste. You will have to top it up with water too but in order for it not to taste watered down and flavourless use the packets of soup.

Not only does this soup serve as a snack, mid-day meal or dinner starter, it makes the house smell delicious too and therefore welcoming.

The first time I made it, it was history. That means it disappeared and was nowhere to be seen anymore. I know dad is gonna love this one!

I would highly recommend making this a day in advance as it is definitely better left in the fridge overnight . It does only need 4 hours chilling time though so if you can’t make it the day before it is not an issue.

I love it when something is so easy to make but 100% worth it when it tastes as if you made a real effort. It is sure to be a crowd pleaser with your friends.

Author: Debbie Widdows

Prep time: 30 mins

Total time: 4 hours (chilling time)

INGREDIENTS

CRUST INGREDIENTS

150g packet gluten-free digestive biscuits

200ml margarine

FILLING INGREDIENTS

250ml single cream

2 x 250g tubs cream cheese

1/4 cup sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

TOPPING INGREDIENTS

1 cup fresh or frozen strawberries, thawed

1 x tablespoon lemon juice

3 x tablespoons castor sugar

INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE CRUST

Crush digestive biscuits. The best way to do this is in the food processor but you can do it with a rolling pin in a sturdy bag.

Melt the margarine. Pour the melted margarine into the crushed biscuits and pulse to combine. Alternatively pour the crushed biscuits into a bowl, pour in the melted margarine and stir to combine.

Press into a 9 x inch pie dish and place in the fridge to chill whilst you make the filling.

FOR THE FILLING

Whip cream and sugar with electric mixer until stiff peaks form.

Lightly whip cream cheese with electric mixer to soften.

Add the whipped cream to the softened cream cheese.

Add vanilla essence and mix until smooth and creamy.

Pour into the chilled pie shell. Place in the fridge for at least 4 hours until set. It is better if left until the next day.

FOR THE TOPPING

Place the strawberries in a small sauce pan along with the lemon juice and castor sugar and cook until reduced and thick.

Mash up strawberries with the back of a fork whilst cooking.

Allow to cool then spread on top of cheesecake. Place back in the fridge to continue chilling.

What better way to celebrate Father’s day than with a braai! Dad will even do it himself and he will love it. What is it about ‘man make fire???’ Braai’s are a wonderful, relaxing and satisfying way to spend a day. I don’t know about you but if I spend a Sunday outside or at the pool braaiing, I find it easier to face the week ahead. I feel as if I have been on a weekend getaway. FYI I checked on accuweather about the weather on 18 June and the forecast is sunny! . Kindly note that I cannot take responsibility for the accuracy of the weather but it says that there is no cloud in sight the whole day. Remember your sun block!!

I comment on recipes for a website called Recipe Lion and Fave Gluten Free Recipes under the username FoodLover where I submitted this recipe. Check it out and more lekker grilling recipes, especially gluten free ones!

I must say that this year, if I am already thinking about Father’s day, I am quite organised. Usually I leave everything till the last minute. Maybe that’s because my father passed away many years ago but my kid’s still have their dad to take care of! So if you have left everything till the last minute I have some remedies for you! I will be posting a recipe for the best fudge ever. We call it Father’s Chunky Fudge because he loves it so much. You can make it with your kids. Or if your kids are old enough you can let them make it on their own. My son is at the age he can make it on his own. His father gets this for father’s day every year. I wonder if he minds?? If he does and you want to get something special have you seen what you can get at Netflorist?

Netflorist have these cool ‘Man Crates and Bro-buckets’. I would get the Castle Braai Bro Bucket. It comes with chips, dry wors, braai marinade, braai spice and beer! A perfect accompaniment for the chargrilled steak braai I’m telling you about below. A big plus with Netflorist is that you can get same day delivery so you can do this at the last minute! . I have used them before for many things, including birthdays.

Have you ever been at work and received that Facebook reminder that it is someone’s birthday? I thanked Netflorist then! I poppped on-line, ordered something and in my fluster got the house number wrong! The poor delivery person went to the wrong house. When they called me I could not, for the life of me, remember the house number and so they kindly went looking for my friend and the found her too! We laugh so much about that now. Where else do you get customer service like that?

FYI if you are short of cash for Father’s day enter the competition below!

Or take an online survey and get paid for it!

There is nothing better on a braai than steak. Steak is meant to be cooked on a grill. It adds to the flavour. I think it is a waste to cook steak on the stove. I’m talking proper rump, sirloin or rib eye steaks. The best way to eat steak is flame grilled! Cooked on a proper coal and wood fire.

Flame grilling your steak will give it that blackened look and taste on the outside but the steak is cooked perfectly to medium rare and still red and moist on the inside. Cooking it this way also ensures that you don’t have blood all over your plate as it is actually under cooked then and not medium rare!

Steak is expensive and you don’t want to spoil it. Don’t do anything to it. Leave it alone. You don’t need any marinade. If you marinade the steak it will turn black. You just need a few spices, or maybe a rub, but you can chose the spices you prefer, and some olive oil.

FYI……you need a braai buddy (or father ) when you cook these! It takes an expert.

Now that’s what I call flame grilled. This only happens for a second.

INGREDIENTS

A good ol’ steak. Chose a choice piece of meat. Rump works the best. T-bones would be good too. Cook a piece which is at least 1 cm thick.

Spices of your choice. I like Worcestershire spice (dried spice, not the sauce) or use the Castle Braai Series spice you get in your Bro Bucket!

Olive oil

INSTRUCTIONS

Get your braai buddy (dad) to make a fire. Sorry I can’t help you with that one. If you need to know how to make a fire then click here: http://braai.com. You need braai buddies anyway as who braais alone? Shame . Perhaps dad wants to watch TV and not braai! Then you have to do it yourself. Now that would a surprise for him!

Put the steak into a dish and drizzle over olive oil. Put in quite a bit as you are going to throw some of it over the fire. This stops the steak sticking to the grid as well and creates the flame you need.

Sprinkle over your spices and you’re good to go!

Sprinkle a little olive oil over the grid and place the steak on top.

Pour the olive oil which is left over in the dish over the steak and grill and be careful! FYI make sure at this stage that you have not consumed too much alcohol and you have a false sense of courage! You do not want to singe off your eyebrows!

Leave to cook on the braai for about 7 minutes. If you feel like it you can turn the steak over and do the flame grill exercise again for fun.

And there you have it. A perfect steak. You can now cook your chicken or lamb chops as the coals will be cooler. You can do the flame grilling effect with that too. It’s the best way to get the chicken skin nice and crispy!

A great accompaniment to the char grilled steak is mushroom moments. Have a look at this recipe!

I made this at my cousin, Rosemary’s, request. I know that it is a favourite among most of the people I know as its simply delicious. I made this gluten-free version of my old classic.

There is nothing like the piquant combination of tart lemon and decadently sweet condensed milk which is the signature of this pie. It makes your mouth water and it never fails to impress. Made with only 6 ingredients, this lemon meringue pie is sure to keep your guests coming back for more. I have also posted this recipe on my trusty website ‘buddies’ Recipe Lion. There are many more recipes such as this one, like Key lime pie, so be sure to go there and check out some other alternatives. This gluten free version is also on Fave Gluten Free Recipes.

It is so easy to make and is prepared in only 20 minutes. There is nothing to it. So give it a try, you are going to be very glad that you did!

PREP TIME: 20 mins

COOKING TIME: 15 mins

COOLING TIME: At least 2 hours

INGREDIENTS

1 tin sweetened condensed milk well chilled

187,5ml bottled lemon juice

3 eggs. Keep one whole and separate 2 (put the egg whites into a clean, separate bowl and mix the yolks together in another bowl)

125ml castor sugar

200ml butter or full fat margarine

1 x 200g packet gluten-free digestive biscuits, crushed. If you want to make a non-gluten-free version of this pie then use 1 x 250 g packet of tennis biscuits (or digestive) and increase the amount of butter to 250ml. The gluten-free biscuits do not come in 250g packets.

INSTRUCTIONS

Crush the biscuits either in a food processor or the old fashioned way by putting them into a plastic bag and rolling them with a rolling pin. Put these into a bowl.

Melt the margarine and mix it with the biscuit crumbs.

Use this to line a pie plate. Put into the fridge to chill while you prepare the rest of the pie.

Beat the condensed milk to loosen it up.

Add the egg yolks and the lemon juice . Beat well.

Pour into the crumb shell. Chill 10-15 mins until the filling thickens.

Beat the castor sugar slowly in the egg whites. Start by beating the egg whites until slightly stiff.

Then add in the sugar and continue beating. Do not add all of the sugar at once. Add some, then beat, add some sugar, then beat and so on. Until the sugar is used up. Do not switch off the beater between additions.

Pile the meringue mixture on top of the set lemon filling.

Bake at 160C for 15 – 20 mins.

Allow to cool and then chill for at least 60 mins before further chilling in the fridge. You can eat it an hour after that but it is better the next day. This pie can last quite a few days in the fridge.

Apologies that there is no picture of the pie with a piece cut out of it! . I gave it away so was not there for the photo! . Sometimes it’s just better and more rewarding to make something for someone else to enjoy. I know it went far and was enjoyed by all Rosemary’s guests .

My cooking ‘adventures’ began by watching the Naked Chef, Jamie Oliver. Right from his very first television show I was smitten because his recipes were easy, affordable and do-able. Everything of his which I tried to cook turned out well, something which had never happened to me before. I can tell you some stories of having people over for dinner, burning sauce (it was a honey and brandy sauce) on the stove and all of us having to stand outside where we were coughing and spluttering and trying to breath, whilst the flat cleared of smoke and an acrid smell. Maybe one day I will post that story. I am not sure whether to classify that as a good or a bad memory!

Getting back to Jamie Oliver….we know he makes good pasta. I know his recipes are easy but I have come a long way since ‘Happy days with the Naked Chef’ and not even Jamie’s gluten free pasta recipe is this easy.

I searched high and low and looked at tons of websites looking for a gluten-free pasta recipe but they all contained so many ingredients and were such a process to make, I was about to give up. Then someone I know gave me this recipe. I have submitted it to My Fave Gluten Free Recipes website. They have many more options to chose from as well. Feel free to check them out if you think they are better than this one but I don’t think you will find a better recipe than this one!

As I have said before in previous posts, I would never have attempted this if not out of necessity. You can buy a bag of spaghetti at the supermarket for R10 but the gluten-free pasta costs R30. A whole bag of gluten-free all purpose flour costs R30 which makes way more pasta than one bag of dried pasta. I thought, why not? I have always wanted to try and make my own fresh pasta so this is the time. I really do enjoy cooking and so I embarked on my endeavour.

You do not have like cooking, or even be good at cooking in order to make your own pasta. I understand your fears and apprehensions because I had them myself but now I wish I hadn’t had them. I have been missing out for years on this wonderful tasting, spectacular creation. I actually can’t wait to have people over for dinner and to declare that I made the pasta they are eating from scratch. It didn’t even take that long. It is definitely an achievable ‘feat’ to make for a dinner party and it would definitely impress your guests. So go ahead, I know you want to!!

Author: Debbie Widdows

Prep time: 30 mins

cooking time: 5-7 mins

Total time: 37 mins

INGREDIENTS

All you need for this recipe is flour and egg. A general rule of thumb to remember when making this pasta is use one egg for every 100 g flour.

Egg sizes differ and you may find that your pasta is dry after adding it. This happened to me. I added in another egg. Then the dough was a bit too wet so what I did was take out the ball of dough and worked in some more flour on the counter top until it had been worked in and the pasta was the right consistency. This was not a lot of trouble and worked well. Don’t worry you have not made a disaster!

100 g all purpose gluten-free four.

1 egg.

If you want to make more pasta add in another 100 g flour and another egg. Keep to this ratio the more pasta you want to make. Then follow the tip above.

INSTRUCTIONS

Place your flour and egg in a food processor and whiz up for about 30 seconds. Don’t add in water if the dough resembles fine bread crumbs as you want a stiff dough structure. Check that you are happy with the consistency (as explained above) and then remove from the food processor onto a floured surface. Knead the dough for 2 to 3 minutes to get the texture right. Remember that you don’t need to knead it too long since there is no gluten to develop.

Divide the ball of pasta into four equal pieces.

Take one piece and roll out. Cover the rest with a wet tea towel.

Roll out into a nice thin dough. I was worried about the fact that I did not have a pasta machine but it was really easy to roll out this dough. It is not a hard dough and not hard work to roll out. Of Course it was easy to make lasagna sheets without a pasta machine. I was not making spaghetti. Roll it as thin as you can without it breaking up. You can then cut it into the slices you want and keep them under a wet tea towel whilst you make the rest. You can neaten up the edges. I cooked the off cuts, tossed them in a bit of olive oil and ate them like that. It was delicious.

DO NOT turn your nose up at this!! You will want to eat it. It truly is delicious. I had never thought of adding an egg to an avocado but I saw this recipe on Fave Gluten Free Recipes and decided to try it. If I hadn’t been so starving whilst I was working I may never have tried it. Trolling recipe websites makes me ravenous! (this emoji is Oliver – in case you didn’t know – You know……’Please Sir, May I have some more!’ .

I made it for a snack but it is great for a breakfast or even a light lunch.

Preheat your oven to 180C.

There is nothing to this recipe. You need a ripe avo and Eggs. I decided to top it off with a few crispy bacon bits but only because I had the bacon and thought ‘why not?’ so that is not necessary but get creative and top it with anything you want. It might go nicely with a some salsa. How about ending it off with your favourite hot sauce? Yum!

You will end up with more egg than fits into the Avo unless you can find huge avos! (and small eggs )

What I do is I have a cup in my fridge where I collect egg whites (I hate wasting anything and they do last quite some time if you cover them properly. I use glad-wrap). Somehow I always seem to have extra egg whites – I have no idea why?? So I started to collect egg whites and I make meringues from time to time. Meringues are great if you are feeling like something sweet, they are easy to make and relatively fat-free if you don’t count the sugar, but use powdered sweetener! Anyway this is for another post, so look out for that!

I acted as if I was separating the yolk from the white so be ready for this. I kept the yolk in half of the shell and put come of the egg white in my cup and then popped the rest of the egg into the avocado hole. Easy, peasy. Some spilled out into the glass dish. So I rested the avo on the counter and poured that egg white into the cup too. If you are going to do something like this just be sure that the egg white is completely clear and clean as if there is even a hint of something in it you will not be able to make meringue at a later stage.

I also used a glass dish to support the avos as it is a bit tricky to keep them upright to hold an egg. Well, it was not that tricky, you can figure it out! .

Sprinkle with some seeds – I used mixed- and a little Cayenne pepper.

Bake in the oven for 15 – 20 mins. I did not want my yolk hard so I baked them for 15 mins. It was at this time I fried my bacon bits.

This is the result.

Yum! Yum! Yum!

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Nothing brings a family together like a good shared meal

Hi, I’m Debbie Widdows. I’m a mompreneur, freelance blogger, compelled health enthusiast and budding author. I became a mompreneur when I gave up working in Corporate Law last year. I’m a single mom of two. My daughter is 24 and my son is 13. Yes, that is a big age gap. I waited a long time for him. I maintain that nothing brings a family together like a good shared meal. Follow me as I talk about life, my kids and healthy eating. I will share my recipes with you, for a happy lifestyle, as well as delicious food.